


rodents, of the murderous variety

by catpoop



Category: Bad Samaritan (2018), Jessica Jones (TV)
Genre: Blood and Gore, Coming Out Of Closets, First Meetings, Gen, Murder, Needles, No Relationship, Violence, baseball bat-caused violence, first and only crossover i will attempt, only enemies to enemies
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-18
Updated: 2019-11-07
Packaged: 2020-10-21 04:07:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 10,386
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20687240
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/catpoop/pseuds/catpoop
Summary: unstoppable force (cale, screaming, with bat) vs unstoppable force (kilgrave, inflated ego, speak english)i.e. what if it was thesamecloset?





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> hm...
> 
> enjoy...
> 
> (quick unbeta'd little thing, just had to get it out)  
(EDIT: now multichap...)

The air tastes of linen and darkness suffuses his vision. Cale Erendreich opens his eyes and the sight that greets him doesn’t change. He’s in a closet.

It’s a foolproof method, one that hadn’t failed him before and will not fail him now. Adjusting his grip on the bat, Cale sits and waits. And he listens.

There is nothing outside the door, because he had chosen to enter when the apartment lay dark and vacant, situating himself behind the smooth panel of the closet door and waiting for the _woman_ to return in ten minutes, as her routine would dictate. The handgun sits nestled against his thigh – for her family. They don’t matter as much, as relatives of a relative of the _fool_ who thought there was not a better day to leave a great dent in the hood of his car. She’s being fixed up right this instant by someone Cale can trust, but the job is of course far from done.

He closes his eyes once more, adjusts the hood of his sweater over his head, and lulls into a peaceful satisfaction. He can hear the viscera already.

On the other side of the door, there is a man’s voice. Then a child’s. A second man. No woman, as of yet, but if there’s one thing Cale has in spades it’s the ability to see a task through to its proper end. And if there is an interruption, he will deal with it swiftly and move on.

There is then an interruption. Two, small interruptions. One large one.

Two children at his feet, one boy one girl, each with their own bullet loaded into the gun at his chest that he has yet to pull out. And one man, an unknown that his planning had not accounted for and a wrench that brings the system crashing abruptly down. 

_No one ever opens the closets,_ Cale fumes, before adrenaline takes over. 

The scream that tears from his throat is guttural and threatening enough to silence the two children and one man temporarily – the baseball bat hopefully forever. His weapon meets abdomen and the man doubles over just as something begins to slip from his lips. A plea, perhaps?

Cale aims his bat for another strike, then a third, the children all the while watching in mute terror. He’ll take care of them later.

Five minutes earlier, Kilgrave strides confidently into what is to be his new home. One part of him takes a moment to appreciate the lavish furnishings, the floor-to-ceiling windows. The other is weighing up his next moves. He offers absent-minded reassurance to the couple within when he spots the _children_ and nonchalance turns to distaste. 

Always ugly, the concept of children, and parents. Though they’ve neatly shut up there is still the matter of the pair of little gremlins standing before him. _Should neither be seen nor heard,_ Kilgrave considers. 

The closet opens. A light blinks into existence. Kilgrave blinks as well – and in that millisecond, the last thing he had expected to see leaps out, wielding something equally inexplicable. The baseball bat to his gut forces all the air from his chest and he doubles over with a cry.

_Stop!_ He wants to say. _Break your ribcage open and put that bat through your brain,_ the alternative, but then the second blow comes, followed by a swift third hit.

“Stop!” The command is weak, but worded with no possibility of misunderstanding. 

Against all odds, the man only continues to scream, an overdone nuisance of a thing, before raising his bat for a fourth blow. The hands Kilgrave has raised in defence do little against the blinding impact that blossoms from the back of his skull and he collapses, quickly incapacitated.

When Kilgrave wakes, disoriented and suddenly craving a long-overdue dinner, it is to the sight of four bodies. No man from before. He would inspect the scene in closer detail, but the stench of gore and pounding headache do not make a happy combination. Nevertheless, it looks as if the man and two children have been taken out by gunshots to the head, the woman by brute force, bat-shaped bruises on her cooling skin. 

The same would be seen on his own torso, he supposes. All in all, not a very efficient execution – he would’ve done a much better job. Scorning the follies of an amateur, Kilgrave hobbles to the bathroom.

It isn’t until he’s cleaned himself up, body on autopilot, when the realisation hits. _Who_ had that man been? Lying in wait, to batter him unconscious and shoot the family dead when Kilgrave had chosen apartment 12B on a whim. 

For once, nervous fear sneaks tendrils into his belly. They disappear a moment later, but the damage has been done. 

Kilgrave knows what he has to do – he has a new target, this one to hunt down and destroy completely.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yes im pretending that just bc cale can’t hear the command, kilgrave can’t get to him. Its called fanon. I and only myself make the rules around here


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> kilgrave is on the prowl

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i really be writing the shortest chapters for this... crack fics r always quick n easy :33

Before the concussion has worn off, Kilgrave has already set his plan into motion. It’s nothing grandiose, but he can claim productivity as he slumps in the armchair, the man in the little office furiously sifting through CCTV data for him and pausing every now and then for Kilgrave to assess every tall Caucasian man. He winces through the glare of the screen and growls.

“That’s not him. Keep going.”

It takes another long hour for Kilgrave to find the man, sneaking through a concealed entrance he had not previously noticed, with telltale bat by his side.

“Sit down,” he commands with a wave of his hand as the technician makes to leave. “Find all the footage of him you can.”

“I-I don’t have access to many cameras.”

“I didn’t ask. Find the footage.”

Kilgrave gnashes his teeth in annoyance when he wakes from a nap an hour and a half later, to find that the cameras within and around the apartment had captured nothing useful in the past thirty days. The man must’ve only been there solely for Kilgrave, and it is with nervous fear turned to anger that he barks:

“Print the pics for me. Then get the fuck out.”

He clenches the sheaf of papers full of pixelated images in one hand and feels, if anything, completely lost. Even watching the technician (petrified in the corridor outside after a much-needed bathroom break) asphyxiate himself to death doesn’t make Kilgrave feel better.

_Cale Erendreich,_ he considers two days later, having scoured many more CCTV cameras and tracked the murderer to his flash lakeside property. Billionaire and supposed recluse, though the frequency with which he is roaming the streets is enough to put Kilgrave on edge. He immediately puts a stranger onto tracking Erendreich, with instructions to notify him regularly. And then he sits, burner phone in hand, and waits.

On the other side of the city, Cale Erendreich has run into a problem of his own. One valet-shaped intrusion, leaving the grimy fingerprints of a toddler all over his property. And then police officers, sniffing far too closely at each and every room until Cale has to resist the urge to send their bodies back to the station as a final warning. But he knows how to evade the law, and even more so how to put a stop to this unwanted chaos.

He follows the boy around the city, all the while juggling ideas of what best to do. The arsenal under his coat hangs heavy on his shoulders, but it lends a determination to his stride as Cale watches Sean enter the FBI field office. 

Positioning himself near its entrance, he takes the time to watch the city go by, an unsheathed needle already ready under his sleeve. The boy will have a surprise waiting for him when he returns. 

A distraction then catches his eye.

Cale can’t admit to any particular observation skills (he’s more of a hands-on guy), but even he can’t miss the familiar face in the crowd.

A lone man, Caucasian, tall and brunet and suited in purple, sitting outside a café with phone intently in hand. Though he can’t see from this distance, Cale can imagine the haphazard scrawl of greenish-purpling bruising that would crawl up his neck and down and across the rest of his body. Brute force tends to do that to a man.

He had ignored the man in favour of eradicating the family as quickly as possible, but now that Cale has time to truly think, he realises what he might have missed. _Who_ is this man – and what is his connection to the Nelsons?

The longer he ruminates, the greater the itch of a job poorly done grows. Cale darts a look at the FBI entrance, then back to the man sitting across the intersection. Sean Falco has yet to return.

He makes the decision in a heartbeat, grip tightening around the plastic syringe and legs carrying him a convoluted path away, then towards the man in purple. Up close, he can see the smattering of bruises that peek from behind the man’s collar in all their watercolour glory.

Kilgrave is having a mediocre day. Sure, the café had made his coffee immediately and to all of his specifications, and the sun beaming down warms his seat outside quite nicely, but he is still feeling disagreeable. 

One of the texts that had come in tells him that Erendreich is just a short distance away, and for now he sips his coffee and scowls. This will be a quick job, especially since his observations have led him to believe that the man has no idea what is coming. Erendreich has not shown a single mite of interest in Kilgrave since that unfortunate night, but it doesn’t hurt to be cautious. Caution in this regard implying a swift yet painful death.

He drums his fingers against the metallic tabletop and savours the caffeine on his tongue. There is no update from his phone.

Unbeknownst to him, Cale has moved from the FBI offices. And his day is about to go from mediocre to worse.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> please tell me there is more than one person interested in this content. im begging you


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for the reader response so far omg

The man’s phone buzzes just as Cale comes sneaking up from behind, but he gives it no thought, focusing entirely on guiding the needle home. Straight through the fabric of the suit, and into the bulk of his shoulder muscle. Cale feels the corner of his mouth pull upwards as the syringe depresses, and he claps his other hand to the man’s opposite shoulder as if he were surprising a friend from behind. And well, it _is_ a surprise.

The intramuscular tranquiliser works fast, and Cale does his best pantomime of a concerned friend, slapping cheeks and shaking shoulders and fixing a determined look on his face as he declines the offers of help and pulls the man upright to brace him on one shoulder. The phone he slips into his own pocket.

From there, it’s a quick hobble back to the car. 

The drive to the cabin takes a little more time. Cale shoulders his way inside the door, carelessly throwing the man to the ground while he himself sits down on the couch, intent on a _proper_ plan of action. Only the small gasp from the corner reminds him of the third occupant in the room.

“Oh – I’d forgotten about you.”

She whimpers. 

The sound is enough to make him groan aloud, reminded of the unnecessary burden he’s placed himself under. _Three_ jobs at once – he’s not a maniac.

“I’m sorry,” he decides. “It was nothing that you’ve done, but you’re going to have to go now. See it as… a shortcut to freedom.”

“Wait, what?” Her voice is hoarse. 

She gets no reply.

Preoccupied with the goal of a task swiftly done, Cale has already returned outside. The pit uncovers with a great creak, and the mite of hope in the woman’s eyes quickly diminishes as Cale drags her outside to stand on its edge.

The bullet misses only because of the scream that topples her, convulsing, into the pit.

“Oops.” He’ll have to retrieve the collar later.

Another gunshot rings out before Cale strides distractedly back into the cabin. 

The man is still lying there and he scrutinises his features closely, tugging suit and shirt aside for a moment to gaze tenderly at the still-healing bruises. No broken ribs protruding under his thumbs, all the more’s the pity.

Now, Cale prides himself on being a man of imagination, which is why he takes the time to consult his stash of equipment before pulling out the same leather fastenings he had used on his last subject. There is a momentary flicker of eyelids as he mercilessly tightens the straps, a weak moan as the gag slips into place.

In his experience, there should be a few more hours before the man wakes, hours Cale decides to put to use once more tracking Sean Falco’s car – this time to more result.

He is smiling to himself at the subtleties of a job well executed (if the response to his Facebook post is any indication) when he returns to the cabin, to one confused, awake, and very angry man.

“Oh. Hello there.”

The man thrashes and screams what could be a curse. In lieu of answer, Cale puts his phone down and sets to making a cup of coffee, taking a sip before letting out a thoughtful hum.

“So… who are you? And how are you connected to the Nelsons? I might let you go if you answer correctly.”

“Hrmmghhfkkk.” The man gives him a pointed stare, index finger curling to point to his gag from where his wrists are bound to his lap.

“Right.” The coffee he sets aside, and Cale dusts his hands off before approaching the man, dimly aware of the way murderous intent has morphed into something a lot more reserved. He manoeuvres the gag free, to raw-red lips curling upwards in a smirk.

“Who are –”  
“_Shut up._”

Cale shuts up. He does so quite willingly, and the confusion is enough to freeze him in place, giving the man time to issue another command before Cale can force the gag back in.

“Get rid of these restraints.” Now frowning, Cale stoops to unfasten buckles, loosen belts, toss padlocks aside. The process takes time, and the man continues to speak, now lounging as if on a throne. “Are you Cale _fucking_ Erendreich.” A pause. “Answer me.”

“Yes.” 

“Just my fuckin’ _luck_,” the man curses. He stands up, shaking his limbs free. “You will let me go. Now shut up, get out of my sight, and hold your breath. Forever.”

It had worked quite well on the technician, Kilgrave recalls. Haughtily dressing himself as Erendreich disappears into a side room, face already turning a little red, Kilgrave makes to leave from the cabin. He feels sore, like he’d recently been run over, but the adrenaline that is still coursing through his veins lends a swiftness to his stride. He hurries out, to quickly realise where he is – Erendreich’s cabin retreat.

The thing about the wilderness is that there aren’t many cars around. Nor many drivers he can sway to his cause to transport him to his next destination. There is a single car, a hulking beast of a silver Maserati. His only way in – the keys in Erendreich’s possession. With a sigh, Kilgrave turns back.

He doesn’t really want to remain in the cabin for any longer than possible, having scrutinised its walls and furnishings for what had felt like hours, gag cutting into his mouth and not a soul around to help him. Still, Erendreich will be dead by now, and a growing confidence has Kilgrave striding loudly back into the lounge area.

The blunt pressure that comes down on the base of his skull a second later is an insult.

Cale’s imagination has helped him out of many a tight scrape. The last instance had been when his pit of bodies had gotten too full to occupy its next victim. This scrape, though on the same property, is a little different. A little more life-threatening.

As the air had grown stale and bottled within his lungs, Cale had started to panic. The man’s commands had repeated in his brain, excessive to the point that if he hadn’t been told to shut up, he’d be muttering the words to himself.

_Hold your breath. Hold your breath._

The thought comes to him about a minute in. Slowly, as if testing the bounds of his freedom, Cale lifts a cupped hand to his mouth. And then he exhales. 

And if he’s fast enough, he can clench his hand into a fist and trap the barest molecules of air inside. All of a sudden, Cale realises he can breathe again. 

He smiles.

Now all he has to do is stay out of the man’s sight. As it turns out, this ends up working in his favour.

He hears footsteps approaching, and instinct takes over. ‘Breath’ now shifted to his left hand, and shovel hefted onto one shoulder, Cale follows his prey and strikes the moment the man is within reach. 

He crumples once more like a ragdoll.

With one hand compulsively clenched and voicebox still not making a peep, Cale sits down to _properly_ think. He still needs to get an answer out of the man, but that last interrogation had been nothing if not disastrous - he has yet to understand what happened. Cale hurries to pick up the discarded gag and secure it.

There. He’ll leave it in for a little longer this time.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> here is a very long chapter. by very long, i mean longer than all 3 prev chapters combined

When a moment has passed, then another, and Cale still cannot make a sound, he starts to panic. If the cause of his anxieties were not in the building with him, he might’ve gone out for a drive. Hit the gym. Reorganised his collections of tools. But because that’s not the case, Cale instead drags the man, one-handed, into the cage, taking every precaution to secure his wrists and ankles. He wouldn’t want the gag getting free.

Prisoner now taken care of, Cale frustratedly paces the length of the other room. The floorboards creak under his feet. His knuckles ache from how his hands have curled into claws. He tries to growl, but nothing comes out.

There’s something he’s missing here, he knows, beyond the mysterious man and the Nelsons and the two concussions Cale has now given him. Something unnatural and unpleasant to admit, some horrendous wrench in the works in a once wrench-free workplace. Given that Cale had structured the environment around him to cater his every like and dislike, he takes this snub to the rules as a personal affront.

The man lays silent in the other room, but Cale can hear his voice regardless, drawling and offensive. The temptation to tear his voicebox from his throat, pummel him to mincemeat, silence the smug bastard once and for all, _grows_.

But the interrogation.

Stomping out of the cabin in lieu of a choice string of swears, Cale settles into his car and speeds off. If he can’t scream or yell, or properly beat someone with both of his fists, then he’ll just have to settle for the alternative. The road to the mansion burns away under his wheels.

There’s nothing like fresh lakeside air to clear the head. Or, in Cale’s case, the lovely collections he keeps hanging in his rooms. He is inspecting the row of hacksaws when the memories distract him just enough. 

The sudden tightness in the back of his throat catches him off guard and Cale splutters, tamping down his panic as he wrestles the situation back under control. _Breathe._

Breathe.

Kilgrave wakes for the third time in too short a span of days with a pounding headache and he just about wants to quit. _This was supposed to be fun,_ he tries to whine, but there is a gag in his mouth. He makes to spit it out, to no avail. 

When his memories return, foggy and disconnected, Kilgrave comes to the realisation that he is now in a cage of some sort, albeit in the same room as before. In the same cabin, the one owned by Erendreich. If the man is still alive, Kilgrave gnashes his teeth, he is going to be in _so much_ shit. 

Kilgrave will personally see to it himself.

For now, though – he has to escape this stupid inconvenience. It takes him an hour of straining to realise that the ties on his wrists and ankles aren’t coming loose, and that no amount of rattling the bars will bust the lock open. He swallows dryly, darts another look around the room, and lies stiff on the cell floor until his muscles eventually grow lax and he falls into a wary stupor.

The silence is broken by a man’s voice. _The_ one man, incidentally, that Kilgrave really doesn’t want to see right now. Dehydration has all but glued the gag to his jaw, and the hungry growl in his stomach isn’t improving his mood. He scowls and summons as threatening a noise he can.

Erendreich just smirks.

“Good morning. I guess your ‘powers’ run out eventually – so don’t think you can threaten me.” He steps closer to the cage then, sliding a key into the lock and easing the door open with a great creak. Kilgrave stares up at him, fear suddenly congealing the blood in his veins.

A hand reaches down and he flinches away, only for fingers to settle in the fabric of the gag. “Don’t try anything funny.” Erendreich says, stern. “And answer my questions properly, or it’ll hurt.”

Kilgrave blinks, almost too stunned to respond, when the leather loosens and unseals from his lips and tongue with a wet sound. He blinks again, then gabbles like his life depends upon it (and it does):

“Don’t kill me. Don’t injure me. Untie me right now.”

“_Fuck!_” Erendreich bellows.

“Don’t try to hurt me,” Kilgrave continues, even as Erendreich stoops to get at his other fastenings. “Don’t get someone to hurt or kill me. Let me go and do as I say.”

“Fuck you,” Erendreich repeats.

Ignoring this, Kilgrave groans as he stretches his four limbs and pushes himself to elbows and knees. “Ow… help me up.” He yelps as two strong arms brusquely grip around his torso and haul him upright. “Be more _gentle!_”

Erendreich stares stonily, but loosens his grip.

Despite the scratchiness in his throat, Kilgrave’s feeling conversational. He waves a casual hand, then pulls it to his chest when his wrist twinges unhappily. “I could kill you right now, even if that first time didn’t work out – how’d you hold your breath for half a day? Anyway – I could make you cut your own throat or scoop your own guts out, but I’m feeling generous.” 

It’s more the fact that he’s feeling lightheaded, and hungry, and very very gross. “Do you have any food or water in this place? Or no – drive me to your mansion! But get me a drink first.”

Erendreich stomps stiffly away, and Kilgrave settles woozily on the bed. He’ll need to sleep for an eternity – hopefully in the luxury of Erendreich’s million-dollar bed, in his million-dollar house. He raises his head when a throat clears.

“Here.” Erendreich thrusts a glass in his face. “Water.”

Kilgrave focuses on the glass and the water within, then back up to Erendreich’s expression of rage. “Hm. I don’t think so. You take a sip first.”

The expression morphs quickly into annoyance then disgust as Erendreich takes the smallest sip of ‘water’ he can.

“Ha! Knew it. What was in that?” Kilgrave watches eagerly, for the man to turn a funny colour, or grasp his throat, or fall to the floor in convulsions. Nothing happens.

“Toilet water…” Erendreich bites out.

“Oh, cute. Get me bottled water. From the fridge.”

The sealed bottle he receives a minute later is much more to his tastes, and Kilgrave takes a long draw before setting it down. “Take me to your mansion. And don’t try to crash the car – remember, that counts as _hurting me_.” 

Erendreich walks off, and Kilgrave lets him get as far as the door before he remembers his own current state.

“Wait – help me into the car. Be _gentle_.”

He leans heavily on the other man, and they hobble out the door and to the car. 

The car seat feels like heaven to Kilgrave’s aching body and he collapses into it in a groan, leaning back as Erendreich settles into the driver’s seat.

“Go on, drive me to your house,” he prompts, and the car glides off without the barest suggestion of a growl. Erendreich is similarly silent. Content, Kilgrave falls into a peaceful stupor.

In the adjacent seat, Cale finds his teeth grinding an awful rhythm as he guides the car up the road and back into their busy metropolitan surrounds. Images are flashing in his mind – of parking the car, and getting out to swiftly execute the man. Strangulation, a keen bullet through the skull, a lakeside and holding him under until the rest of his limp body follows. But as soon as Cale tries to put his thoughts into motion, he finds he cannot move.

He can only drive, and keep driving.

He can feel the man smiling dumbly beside him, no doubt basking in the control he has regained, and Cale audibly seethes.

“Who are you,” he barks. The man startles in his seat before answering, but it doesn’t help Cale’s mood.

“So, Cale Erendreich… you don’t know who I am.” If he had to be honest, the man sounds almost surprised. “You can call me – Kilgrave.”

The name means nothing to Cale. He grunts.

“Why were you in apartment 12B?” Kilgrave continues.

Cale recognises the number, and it pulls his intended interrogation to the forefront of his mind. “What is your association with the Nelsons?” He counters. He doesn’t recognise the name Kilgrave from their files, though it hardly seems like the man’s real name.

“I’m asking the questions here,” Kilgrave says, stern. “Answer me.”

Cale’s grip tightens on the steering wheel. “I had to punish them, of course. They got what they deserved.”

“So you weren’t waiting for me?”

“No.”

“Huh.” The man exclaims to himself. “I’d talk more,” he then continues, “but I’m feeling rather _concussed_ right now. No thanks to you. I hope you realise there’ll be consequences…” 

The car returns once more to silence, and Cale still hasn’t learnt a single thing.

He forces his attention back on the road, the scene stretching out before him a meagre distraction but all he has right now. Kilgrave’s head rends open beside him to reveal viscera and he feels the ache in his chest loosen a little. 

They roll to a halt in front of the opening garage door. Kilgrave makes a luxurious noise.

“Oh! Lovely place you have here. I mean, I knew that already but –”

Cale bristles. “What do you mean?”

“I mean,” Kilgrave says languidly, gesticulating as he speaks, “I put someone onto following you. Could’ve killed you right here – _should’ve_, even. Anyway… show me around. I need a shower. And I expect _food_ on the table once I’m out.”

_Following – ?_ The revelation startles Cale, and even as his body and mouth switches to ‘showing’ the man ‘around’, he is planning that interrogation. Third time lucky, perhaps…

They pass through the kitchen. Kilgrave hadn’t specified what food precisely, and Cale makes a note to pile a bag of fertiliser onto the dining table. He’d hate to mix garden and _indoors_, but there are some things that desperation will push a man to do. One of them is torture with intent to kill. The other is – upsetting every carefully-planned routine that has built Cale’s life into what it is now. He shudders at the thought.

Though distracted momentarily, Cale finds his focus quickly returning to his prisoner-of-a-body, now walking upstairs to direct Kilgrave to the upstairs shower. 

“I hope you drown,” he spits.

Kilgrave only smirks. “Cute. Get me clean towels. Clean clothes,” he instructs brusquely before disappearing into the bathroom. Cale dutifully fetches the necessities, to kick them into a heap by the door. 

He stomps back downstairs.

Though he hates to admit it, Cale is not what one would call an emotionally stable man. His emotions have done many things for him in life, most of them less than ideal and verging close to ‘regrettable’. But Cale doesn’t regret – this would imply he had made a mistake, and neither does he make mistakes. It is with this clear, intentioned train of thought that Cale picks up the nearest figurine (equine in form) and dashes it to the ground with a scream. Then he screams once more.

Then, hair snarled in one fist and tears threatening to spill, Cale cleans up the porcelain shards one by one. They disappear into a wrapping of newspaper then into the bin.

When Kilgrave returns downstairs, the living room is back to its pristine nature and there is a single, unpeeled onion sitting on the kitchen island.

“Eat up,” Cale bites.

The man chuckles. “Oh, very funny.” He looks fresher now, though still walking with a slight limp. Cale should have hit him harder when he had the chance, should have forcibly paralysed him from the waist down. Or up. As he thinks about cutting out that damned tongue, Kilgrave opens his mouth again.

“I’d ask you to cook for me, but you don’t look like someone who knows how to. What did you have for lunch yesterday?”

“Italian.” He hadn’t cooked it himself, admittedly.

“Oh… I could do with some Italian. Hand me your phone. Unlocked.”

In slow motion, Cale pulls the phone from his pocket, flinching as it transfers hands. He can only watch balefully as Kilgrave taps eagerly at the screen, letting out small sounds of consideration as he scrolls through restaurant menu after restaurant menu. 

“You don’t mind if I pay using your card.” It isn’t a question. “I am your guest here, after all…”

Kilgrave tosses the phone carelessly to the counter once he’s done, and Cale snatches it up on reflex, growling at the smears of damp fingerprints. 

“That’s not a very nice sound,” Kilgrave remarks. He then looks at the onion. “And that’s not a very nice thing to offer someone. As a meal.”

Cale isn’t sure where this is going. “Right.”

The man’s tone switches quickly to commanding, as he lounges and raises one arm to point loftily at the kitchen bench behind Cale. “Take a knife. A sharp one, please.” Cale does as he instructs, very suddenly realising where this is going. He picks the smallest implement possible. “Now point it at your thigh. Dig the point _in_. Ah – a bit to the left.”

The muscles in Cale’s right arm ache with how they’re clenched, but it doesn’t stop him from positioning the knife just as Kilgrave instructs. Metal bites into denim bites into skin, and he knows how easily that flesh will part if Kilgrave just tells him to press a bit harder. He knows how much it will bleed, too. He thinks of the mess and almost lets his façade slip to beg for a tarpaulin. 

Instead, he growls once more. “I’m not scared of you.”

“What about knives?” Kilgrave leans forwards. “Press harder. Until it’s a centimetre in.”

Cale swears. He’d chosen so the wound wouldn’t be too big, but the blade still hurts. _And,_ a distant part of his brain reminds, _that’s a fruit knife._ Not for cutting up meat, and definitely not for cutting up humans. He thinks of his stash of job-appropriate tools, almost longingly.

“_Deeper_.” Kilgrave taunts, and there is definitely blood beading up on the floor now, smudged red in the sharpened field of his vision. Cale hisses. 

“Until it’s halfway in. Good. Now twist it.”

Cale shouts, vision whiting out for a second, to return to a bleary image of Kilgrave’s entertained expression.

“Leave it there.” The man finishes. “_Don’t_ touch it.”

Now finally free to grip the counter with both hands, Cale leans heavy against its edge, letting the air fills his lungs and flow steadily out in noisy exhale. He’s done this before, had to grin and bear a flesh injury. What he _hasn’t_ had to do is hang onto his pride while a self-satisfied jerk of a Brit sits and watches and urges him on. 

And he realises now, why Kilgrave had adjusted the knife for him. So he could avoid hitting bone, to go deeper. _The sick fuck…_

Kilgrave watches him for a moment, expectant, then looks away when Cale offers no response. 

“Why hasn’t the food arrived already?” 

The food arrives. Eventually. Kilgrave snatches it from the delivery man and slams the door in their face. 

“Fucking _finally_,” he crows, breathing in the warm perfume of freshly-made Italian food. God, he hasn’t felt this hungry in ages.

He shoots a stern look at the cause for his hunger, then settles happily on the couch to start digging in. Erendreich is still frozen by the counter, face turning gradually paler as his leg continues dribbling blood onto the floor.

“How’re you doing there?” He asks through a mouthful. “Try not to bleed _too_ much, or it’ll start to stink. And I’m trying to eat.”

“Fine.” Erendreich grunts. The next words spill from his mouth in a rush, and if possible, he looks a little paler for doing so. “Don’t eat on the couch.”

“You think you can tell me what to do?” Kilgrave laughs. “Piss off. No, actually – fetch me a drink. Wine, maybe. Get me the most expensive bottle from that rack.” He nods at the rack across the room, lips crooking into a grin as Erendreich hobbles gingerly over, then back towards him. 

“And a wineglass – how do you expect me to drink this?” Erendreich does another lap of the room, hissing with pain, and Kilgrave actually laughs out loud this time. “There,” he says once the first sip of wine is in his throat, “that wasn’t that hard, was it? Be faster next time.”

The food in his belly and the drink in his veins is helping his mood, and Kilgrave nods at the other couch. “Go on, sit down. We could share a drink, even.”

Erendreich all but collapses into the plush cushions, before silently reaching over to grab the bottle and take a long pull from it. His leg continues to bleed.

There is a tense silence before he finally says, with a great heaving sigh that cuts off into a wince, “Can I bandage it up.”

“Hmm.” Kilgrave scoffs more of his food and chews thoughtfully. “Sure. Why not. You know what’ll happen if you try disobey me again.”

He watches idly as the man staggers upright, to disappear through a doorway. When he returns, in shorts and thick gauze, Kilgrave has finished off the food. He is steadily working through the wine, and contemplating the pros of a late-afternoon nap. Or rather, a decent sleep that hadn’t come from being whacked over the head.

Erendreich has a cloth and bucket with him and Kilgrave watches, entertained, as the man crouches down, wincing with every movement.

“I didn’t ask you to clean the floor,” he remarks.

Erendreich’s reply is directed at his hands, tone unwavering. “I’m cleaning the floor.”

“Responsible of you.”

He sets the wineglass down a moment later, finally too tired to continue. He declares as much to the room at large, to no response. “Which one was your bedroom again? Answer me truthfully.”

“Second on the right.”

He smiles. “Don’t disturb me while I’m sleeping.”

If it weren’t for his current lack of coordination, Kilgrave would all but skip up the stairs. He feels exhausted, but the ache has tempered into a mellow burn now that he knows he will wake in Erendreich’s bed, well-fed and well-rested and with a new subject to torture.

He falls asleep with a smirk on his face.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thankye 4 read
> 
> edit: goddamnit i just realised i shouldve gotten cale to fuck up the 'clean clothes' command like he did with the onion...  
kilgrave emerging from the shower to find only a single shrunken jersey and a small towel


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [:

When Kilgrave wakes, having slept like a baby, it is to Erendreich’s face glaring from the bedside.

“What?” He yawns. “Here to keep me company?”

“Waiting to kill you,” Erendreich mutters in a menacing growl. 

Judging by how he’s still alive, Kilgrave can assume that the commands have yet to wear off. He turns onto his side with a sigh and refreshes them in one easy breath. Just in case.

“Don’t kill me, don’t injure me, don’t –”

The words press angrily on Cale’s eardrums. He had, in fact, spent a majority of the previous hours running through every possible way to separate Kilgrave’s head from his neck. His tongue from his mouth. His spine from his – and so on. But his thoughts never translated themselves into action and so he sat and waited and imagined. And now Kilgrave wakes up.

Cale has always had a talent for concentrating, his focus unrivalled and precise to never leave a job unfinished. In this current moment, his concentration is pacing within the confines of his own imprisonment. _Another twelve hours,_ Cale promises himself. He’ll kill Kilgrave then.

“- don’t think about killing me,” Kilgrave adds, nonchalant.

Cale goes rigid. Every thought he had been collecting is wiped clean, the shock of it leaving his brain reeling. He puzzles over the sensation. Something about – something about…

But nothing comes to mind. 

“What are you thinking about?” Kilgrave asks with a keen stare.

“I –” It takes a moment. “Horses.”

Kilgrave wrinkles his nose. “Horses, huh?”

Not precisely, now that Cale has been given another moment to collect his thoughts. He thinks about Sean Falco, then the man in his bed, then the man in his _house_. He thinks about wrath, and killing Sean Falco.

He hears a laugh. “You don’t need to think for that long.”

“Stay out of my bed,” Cale says instead.

There is a contemplative pause, Kilgrave making a show of staring up at the ceiling in thought. “Hm… no thanks.” 

He gets out of the bed in one languid motion, scratching his belly and yawning widely, sheets kicked aside as he stomps towards the door. Cale darts one desperate look at the duvet half-piled on the floor before deciding to instead follow Kilgrave down the stairs.

The man makes it as far as the kitchen before turning around. “Why’re you following me. Oh wait – give me your phone.”

“No, fuck you,” Cale manages, even as he hands the phone over, palms growing clammy as he tracks Kilgrave’s every movement. The room is silent aside from the slightest tap of skin to glass, though Cale fancies he might hear a vein pop in his head if this carries on for any longer. 

Kilgrave puts the phone down instead of handing it back. 

Though the man looks to be either sleeping or eating or lazing around whenever Cale sets his eyes on him, Kilgrave has managed to set up some kind of base of operations. On his bedroom wall, specifically. Cale tore it down the first time he saw the glossy printed pictures, to then suffer the indignity of standing paralysed in the bathtub for twelve hours.

(“So you don’t make a mess,” Kilgrave assures.)

He hasn’t touched the photos since. 

They’re of a woman, the same woman, curated with an obsession that rivals Cale’s but nowhere near as organised. (He scowls at the hasty overlapping of photos _pinned_ to his walls, the piles of paper that build up on the desk, the floors, the nightstand.) Now free to think, Cale considers killing the man, but also thinks about the laughable tragedy of obsessing over a _lover_, of all things. 

He looks at Kilgrave, and sees a sad joke of a waste of time.

Kilgrave barks at him to stop staring.

But despite the hostility, the pest remains a constant in his house. 

“Why are you here. Why won’t you leave.” Cale would never admit to begging, but the question leaves his lips for the dozenth time in what can only be termed desperation. It has been far too many days, and the urge to set fire to his bed and the man within is growing painfully irritating. Not to mention he has had to put his plans for Sean Falco on a temporary hold, to instead remain at home and play supervisor.

The job does not have its benefits.

Kilgrave’s droning voice is a constant echo around the vast network of rooms, and it does things to Cale’s blood pressure. Currently, however, he is silent, settled comfortably on the couch with a tablet cradled in his lap. He tenderly strokes the woman’s face on the screen and the image shivers before returning to normal magnification. 

Kilgrave frowns. 

“Why won’t you piss off,” Cale tries again, directing his question at both the man before him and any god that may be listening. Though there is one god he is particularly placing his bets on, the fact that two days have already passed is diminishing his confidence.

“…Language,” Kilgrave mumbles idly. 

Cale clenches his jaw, prepared for the instruction to come, to bite his tongue or his cheek or clench his jaw until something cracks. Nothing happens.

Kilgrave once more zooms into the picture, fingers spreading obscenely and face lighting up with childish glee. It has been the same picture for the past hour, and Cale only wants to sit down in his living room without feeling persecuted. Instead, he remains a statue on the far side of the room.

Another half-hour passes before Kilgrave finally puts the device down, expression shifting from distracted pleasure to an affected sneer that is quickly growing familiar. In Cale’s opinion, it makes him look like a cartoon villain. 

“What were you asking before?” Kilgrave considers with a languid tilt of the head. “Was it something rude?”

Cale bites his tongue. 

“I mean, if you don’t like it here, you can leave.” He proposes brightly.

“I wouldn’t trust you to keep this place standing for a day,” Cale blurts.

“Oh?” Kilgrave raises a brow. “You’re welcome to stay. Just don’t piss me off.”

Cale leaves the room instead of beating the man’s face in.

They don’t talk again, not for another several days. At least, nothing that would count as a conversation. Kilgrave likes to talk, likes to regale an empty room with the tales of his conquers. And if the room doesn’t speak back, then so be it.

Erendreich doesn’t reply, but it _is_ entertaining watching the stony look on his face grow ever stonier with each sentence. He always leaves the room eventually, and Kilgrave continues.

He’s got plans for Jessica, he does, hopeful imaginations too. His fantasies unravel in spectacular detail and the lovely warmth that grows in his belly with each possibility leaves him squirming. He’ll capture Jessica first – no, eliminate her friends, singular _friend_ – capture her, move into a lovely penthouse suite, or her childhood home, or, or – 

“Do you think she’d love me?” He blurts. “Surely. Surely, definitely – who wouldn’t?”

Erendreich responds a while later with a cut-off scream from upstairs, one of many that have resonated through the building in the past week. Grimacing at the ceiling, Kilgrave takes a second before deciding to peel himself from the couch and head upstairs. He’ll stop by the _Wall_, as well.

Erendreich is sounding not too unlike an animal in its death throes when Kilgrave pops his head through the doorway of his office. 

“Your yelling is ruining the mood.”

The man looks up for a split second, gaze sharp enough to pierce flesh, or sharper _than_, Kilgrave amends, as he eyes the letter opener beside the monitor. 

“You get a lot of letters, then?”

Erendreich immediately trains his eyes on the item of interest, expression turning conflicted. “And what about it.”

“Oh, nothing! Just wondering what you’d look like if you put that through your windpipe,” Kilgrave muses. In this way, he thinks himself quite the imaginative fellow. Takes pride in it, even, the first time he conjured up some fanciful way of self-death and carried through. (It had been a pencil through the brain. Not his brain, nor his pencil, of course.)

Erendreich’s hand twitches on the desk but makes no move towards the small knife. Because Kilgrave hadn’t instructed him so. The reply comes as he chuckles to himself, backing out of the room. 

“…Not well.” 

That pulls a second laugh from Kilgrave’s throat. “Hah! Funny man. You get to live another day. Whatever.”

He pulls himself out of the room then, palms clapping loud against doorframe. Another noise from Erendreich drags him back in.

“If you’re just going to kill me, why not do it now?”

“I’m not _just_ going to kill you,” Kilgrave drawls. He pauses, then, missing the second half of his statement. Erendreich looks similarly expectant, raising one questioning eyebrow when Kilgrave bows out of the conversation and slinks back to the (his, now) bedroom. 

He _should_ just kill Erendreich, right? So what’s stopping him?

The answer comes soon enough, a blinding reminder that should’ve been apparent much earlier on. Kilgrave blames it on the complex machinations of his brain – busy, far too busy to consider matters outside of his own head. 

“I’m headed out.” Erendreich states shortly. “Don’t – oh, what’s the point.” He trails off in a mutter. 

Kilgrave perks up from where he’s belly-down on the couch. “Don’t what? And where’re you going?”

“I –”

“_Tell me._”

An exasperated roll of the eyes. “Don’t make a mess of the house. I’m going to kill Sean Falco’s girlfriend.”

“Oh, murder! Forgot you did that.”

The stare boring into the side of his head grows baleful and confused in equal parts. “Right. I’m headed out.”

“Cheerio!”

When Erendreich returns, Kilgrave has thoroughly educated himself on the Sean Falco situation. He’d demanded access to the main computer a few days ago, much to Erendreich’s consternation. Some boy, then. Some boy and his family and his Facebook account and his life, carefully doomed to failure.

Kilgrave leans over the landing as the front door clicks open. 

“Where’s the body?”

“…No body.”

“What, even with all that kit you’ve got in the garage?” Kilgrave has happily shown himself around every room, and that particular one was not left untouched.

Erendreich shucks his gloves off and stamps upstairs, roughly shouldering past Kilgrave to his office.

“What about next time, then? You’ve got more planned.” He considers. “Bring back a body next time.”

It’s not a command, and Erendreich does a double-take. He pauses. “Why? What does it matter to you?”

“Would be interesting.” 

“It takes planning to bring a body back,” Erendreich frowns. “Much easier to leave it at the crime scene.”

His patience is quick to run thin, and the exclamation all but bursts out of him. “Then plan it! Just bring back the body next time, will you?” Kilgrave flings an exasperated hand skywards. “Do something _interesting_ with your life, have some _fun_. You’re telling me you spend all your time not sleeping and sulking behind your desk?”

(And the man doesn’t appear to get much sleep, because Kilgrave enjoys the occasional midnight snack or two and has, invariably, found Erendreich standing sentinel by the kitchen counter. He hadn’t even been dressed in nightwear.)

“Not all the time.” He sounds a touch defensive, edging closer to the office doorway. “And if the police come sniffing, you’re dealing with them.”

“Oh, that’s easy,” Kilgrave assures. “Who’s your next target, then? Little Sean’s family?”

A brief alarm flashes in Erendreich’s widening eyes before he schools himself – though it quickly reappears as Kilgrave follows him further into the room.

“…No. An associate of his.”

As Erendreich hovers silently in the doorway, Kilgrave has already situated himself behind the desk, leaning against the back of the seat and peering at the monitor. He reaches for the mouse, and it is that slightest action that brings Erendreich marching up beside him, muttering a sharp ‘Excuse me’ before sitting down. 

Kilgrave snickers, but steps to the side.

“What do you want.” The question, as always, is directed to a space _adjacent_ to Kilgrave, but never directly at him. Currently, Erendreich is sending a fierce glower at the screen and Kilgrave leans in closer to see what’s troubling him. The desktop (horses) gazes peacefully back.

“Show me the murder!” Kilgrave grins. “Well, no, the guy you’re going to murder. How are you going to go about murdering him? Try something inventive, maybe?” He claps both palms to the desk, leaning forwards then back once more then catching a hand under Erendreich’s chin. His head turns, but stiffly. 

They make eye contact, though one part reluctant. Kilgrave waggles a brow. “You seem like someone who’s too rich and got far too much time on their hands – you can come up with something inventive, right?”

“I suppose.” Erendreich says, disgruntled. 

Kilgrave takes a double-step back, feeling the grin on his face stretch wider. “That’s a man!” _There’s_ the excitement he needs in life! The fact that he could carry out such a murder, or any murder, at any point in time, isn’t lost on Kilgrave. Regardless, he saunters out of the room with a lighter swing to his step.

He pauses when an additional thought comes to mind. “If you can’t come up with anything, I’ll tell you what to do. I don’t need you ruining this murder.”

Erendreich only scowls. 

With that sorted, Kilgrave settles back for a relaxing evening, takeout in his lap as he sprawls across Erendreich’s master bed. For good measure, he calls out into the corridor, when he hears the man walk by:

“I’m eating in your bed, Cale! I just dropped some pepperoni. How does that make you feel?”

The answering grunt is sweeter than the chocolate lava cake that bursts across his tongue.

Despite Kilgrave’s instructions, Cale readies a bat and his most non-descript hoodie. He has a man to take out, and he’ll do it in the most efficient way possible. And Kilgrave won’t know, not when he deposits the body in the room downstairs, lays out the saws and the tarpaulins, lets the man perform whatever idiocy he wants.

Kilgrave stops him the moment he strides downstairs with a bat in hand.

“Wait. Where’re you going? What’s that bat – no, I’ve seen that before, haven’t I?” Cale waits as instructed, though his grip on the bat tightens tenfold. He wants to put it through the idiot’s brain. “That’s the bat you whacked me over the head with! Wait – tell me where you’re going. Not for a spot of baseball, am I right?”

Cale lets out a short exhale. “I am – going to kill Derek Sandoval.”

“Right, right.” Kilgrave nods, pulling himself to his feet. “And you’re doing that with the baseball bat, right?”

“Yes.”

“That’s not very imaginative,” Kilgrave scolds. “And you gave me one hell of a concussion with that thing. I don’t like it. Put it away.” 

Cale drops the bat with a clatter. 

His teeth grind together with a horrific noise and try as he might, he can’t get his jaw unclenched. _I have a schedule,_ he thinks furiously. Kilgrave invites him to sit on the couch, and he sits, but not without another longing glance at the door to the garage.

“See, that’s your problem, Cale Erendreich,” Kilgrave says conversationally, clicking the last syllable. “You can’t just bop someone over the head with a great big bat and call it _finesse_. How many times have you done that already?”

“Fifteen.” Cale admits, and the look on Kilgrave’s face tells him it was very much the wrong answer. Not that he could have given any other answer beside from the truth.

“Fif_teen?_ Are you kidding me? Where’s the fun in that? You’re better off buying a legal little handgun and popping fifteen little bullets inside and shooting all them once in the head.”

Cale thinks about his wall of firearms and pulls a face at the hand gesticulating rudely at him.

“This is why you’re living such a dull life, you know.” Kilgrave muses, “All work and no play. See, if I were – ”

“If you let me go,” Cale interrupts, “then I can kill him and bring his body back. Like you wanted.”

Kilgrave pouts. Cale’s never seen a grown man do such a thing. “That’s no fun though. What about…” he sticks his tongue out then, in thought, and an excruciating second passes as Cale stays glued to the couch. “What about if you were to cut a hole in his belly and tug his guts out while he bleeds to death?”

Cale wrinkles his nose at the thought. “Why would I do that.”

“Because I _want_ you to do it, maybe?” Kilgrave scowls. “Did you forget who’s in charge here?”

He hasn’t.

Kilgrave shakes his head wearily. “Would that even be entertaining? No – hm…”

The clock is ticking away, and Cale is itching to leave. “If you let me leave _now_, I can bring him back immediately.”

Kilgrave bristles at that, leaping from the couch in one swift movement to scream in Cale’s face: “You’re doing what _I_ tell you to! Don’t think you get a choice here!” 

Cale blinks, but doesn’t flinch.

A pause before Kilgrave slouches back down, voice suddenly calmer. “No. No, you’re right, that’s too much waiting. Bring him back here alive. Go on. _NOW!_”

Cale rises woodenly to his feet. He collects the necessary tools for restraint and abduction, and Kilgrave rushes to chase him out the door, manic grin on his face.

“Go on! Go get that stupid Derek, tie him up, whatever. Get him back here _breathing_. As fast as you can. I’m not a man to wait.”

And with that, Cale eases into his car, syringe in one pocket and zip-ties in the other. The half-formed plan in his brain is warring for space with the ugly curl of fury frying up his frontal lobe, and Cale screeches to a halt half a block away from Derek Sandoval’s apartment, guided only by basic murderous instinct. 

He emerges from the car with a sigh. Well, if he’s going to be _fast_ about this…

Cale slinks out of the apartment fifteen minutes later with a great big hiker’s backpack on his shoulders, and he is noticeably huffing and puffing on his way back to the car. The pack rolls into the trunk with a thud, and he shakes his shoulders out before clambering back into the driver’s seat. 

It’s definitely not his preferred way of doing things, and the frown has deepened on his face when he returns home. Kilgrave greets him at the door with a beaming smile bright enough to mimic genuine happiness.

“You’re back!”

“I’m back.”

“Where’s the body then, eh? Bring it out, bring it out!”

Cale jerks his head back towards the garage. “He’s in the side room.”

“Of course he is! Now, do you want to run this, or should I?” Kilgrave doesn’t give him time to answer before continuing, “No – maybe you should do this. It’s your moment, isn’t it? Give you something to write home to Mummy and Daddy about.”

Cale ignores the rambling to push past the man and re-enter the brightly sanitised room. In the centre, Derek is laid out on the table, chest rising and falling with that slow cadence of a man unconscious.

“There he is,” Cale pronounces. 

“You haven’t really done much to him,” Kilgrave says in disapproval. “Where’s the cuts? The bruises?”

“I was being _fast_.”

“Right.” Despite his words a second ago, Kilgrave reaches eagerly for the nearest saw, snatching it off the wall and swinging its cord around. “Where’d you plug this in, then? How’d you operate it?”

Cale nods at the clearly visible sockets just on the wall behind him. A muscle twitches in his jaw as Kilgrave, with all the finesse of an overeager toddler in a candy store, plugs the tool in and switches it on with a great howl of delight.

“Ha ha! Look at that! I could just go in, right there –” In the blink of an eye, he’s sawed Derek’s foot off, and Cale claps an exasperated hand to his face as the boy wakes up with a scream.

“I haven’t tied him up yet, you idiot!” At least the foot-and-ankle is lying on a tarpaulin. Kilgrave eagerly punts it across the room and it hits the opposite wall with a soft thud.

“Are you kidding me…” Cale mutters to himself as Kilgrave laughs gleefully, now positioning his saw a little higher up on the same leg. Thankfully, he’s nothing if not a man prepared, and a handful of zip-ties sees Derek temporarily, if not efficiently, strapped to the table.

He lets out a moan, then, though it morphs easily into a yell when he makes eye contact with the both of them. Kilgrave doesn’t appear to register any of this, his eyes blank with the same joy he gets when he’s looking at _Jessica_.

Cale sighs, considering the carnage before him. _Right... gag._

“Wh-What –” Thankfully, the hard edge of terror in Derek’s voice has paralysed his body also, and Cale easily manoeuvres a gag between his teeth. He is quick to pull his hand away when Derek bites down, eyes bulging to stare at the lunatic at the other end of the table.

Kilgrave giggles to himself.

There are many, _many_ ways to effectively end a person’s life, Cale thinks, and a good majority of them involve much less blood and gore than whatever Kilgrave is currently fancying doing. The buzz of the saw mutes within flesh and Cale has half a mind to leave the room entirely – if he were the kind of irresponsible who would entrust a toddler with an armada of weaponry.

The saw is still whirring as Kilgrave tosses it aside, attention switched entirely to a set of slim, pointed knives. Cale lunges to unplug it with a muttered curse.

“What are you doing down there?” The question comes a second later, whimsical and plainly curious in tone. Cale looks up with disgust creasing his face.

“I’m – I’m tidying up after you. Because you can’t seem to do it yourself.”

Kilgrave shrugs. The knife in his hand swings upwards with a fluid movement. “Oh. Good for you. Anyway, what do you think I should…”

Another scream rings out as the knife seeks its target, higher up on the body this time. Cale ignores it, too busy thumbing at the gory build-up on his saw blade, and more importantly, the chips in what was once a perfect row of teeth. He swears, loudly. It’s not loud enough to disrupt the muttered monologue happening half a room away. 

The discovery carries him stalking into the garage, and Cale crumples, elbows impacting knees, into a tense squat. _Trust that stupid –_

He rubs at his temples for an agonising minute before noticing the gore on his hands and now, face. The swear that rings out follows him to the bathroom upstairs. 

When he comes back down, near tripping over himself in his rush to return to the scene, it is to the man meeting him at the base of the steps, smearing handprints onto his (Cale’s) shirt with a distinct look of annoyance.

“I’m going to need a new shirt.” He says as greeting.

Cale shoots a frantic gaze at the open doorway to the garage, then back to the man’s unaffected stare. “What happened to Derek?”

“Oh. Got bored.” He squints at Cale. “Clean up that mess. It’s going to stink up the place.” With that, he strides off, footsteps heavy on each ascending stair. Cale hopes, and he hopes this with all his heart, that there is not a _spot_ of gore to be seen when he checks the upstairs rooms later. 

He’s holding back the urge to scream bloody protest as it is right now, and the dull look on Kilgrave’s face is enough for him to kill the man ten times over. He takes that anger out somewhere else.

Despite that, there is something supremely less satisfying about the rictus of Derek’s face, staring up at him until Cale seals the body away into a bag.

He shakes his fingers out with another curse, then kicks the table for good measure. None of it makes him feel the slightest bit better. And ahead of him – hours and hours of clean up. Cale swallows back bile and resigns himself to work.

He throws in the towel an unknown hours of work later, slamming the door shut on the now-clean room. A body bag sits ready for disposal, but he’ll take care of it later. For now, there’s nothing he wants more than a hot shower and some peace. Even the bloody footprints on the shower mat can’t divert his intentions, though it sours his mood almost immediately. 

He takes care to avoid the mat on the way out.

There is an indistinct holler from next doors. Unsurprisingly, Kilgrave is holed up in his bedroom. Somewhat more surprising is the fact that Kilgrave looks to be truly, absolutely pissed.

Cale reflexively clears his throat, and the man doesn’t look up from where he is half-hanging off the bed, a picture of Jessica pressed to his nose, though he lets out a hum.

“What’s the big occasion?” The man’s always been tipsy, but never this far gone, and Cale eyes the bottle of whisky on his nightstand with considerable longing. He could do with some moderate sedation right about now, when his hands are sore from scrubbing and his head sore from many more burdens.

“…no reason. Murder’s fun.” He pauses, lifting the picture for a millisecond. “No reason.”

Cale feels his lip curl in a scowl. “You hardly murdered him.”

“Hmm.” Kilgrave turns ungracefully onto his belly then, reaching for the whisky with one hand before clumsily directing the bottle to his lips with both hands. Cale decides to find something else to drink.

His head feels a little clearer after a half dozen shots, and the ruckus from upstairs fades pleasantly into the rumble of white noise. He can almost sleep, cocooned in the starched sheets of the guest room. But sleep aside, what’s more important is that he wakes _up_ the next day. 

The same cannot be said for Kilgrave.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :]
> 
> kilgrave tells cale to stand still for 12hrs, not knowing that cale has done that exact thing already but in the living room watching him leaf through the same four pictures of jessica

**Author's Note:**

> want more? have suggestions? need to complain to the manager? PLEASE LEAbE COMMENT
> 
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